Sunday, February 23, 2014

HYPOGEUM OF TREBIUS JUSTUS

It consists of an access corridor, a vestibule and a square burial chamber covered with a vault. There are niches in the side walls and on the main wall there is an arcosolium (arched niche). The hypogeum is entirely dug in the pozzolana rock and inside the walls are lined with bricks

Important paintings are visible, still well preserved, in which are there are portraits of the owner of the tomb, Trebius Justus, with his wife, his son who was buried here, and other characters

MAIN WALL

In the upper part "Young man seated maybe his son, Justus Trebius Asellus (donkey), who died at 21 years, 7 months and 25 days with his mother at his side, maybe Honoratia Severina and a man, maybe Trebius Justus himself, who tend a cloth on which there are various items"

"Objects functional to the exaltation of his status as are arranged in the air, without any apparent realistic relationship, but clearly linked to a symbolic concept. It was considered more important, in fact, the most immediate evidence of the rank of the character, expressed through attributes, that a faithful representation of the reality of the attributes themselves" (Gian Luca Grassigli - TMG)

Under the arcosolium "Trebius Justus among some farmers who have brought baskets full of products of the land"

SIDE WALLS

"Construction of a building": on the left a scene of a construction site, on the right Trebius Justus talking to another character, magister Generosus, probably a mason

From these paintings, it is possible to deduce that Trebius Justus was a builder as well as a rich landowner

A current interpretation relates the characteristics of the tomb to a heretical Christian sect, and attempts to explain everything in a symbolic way. The effigy of a woman with monstrous beard seems to support this theory seems confirming the possibility of some Gnostic rituals

It is more likely however that any symbolic intent is to be excluded, and that representations of everyday life, would not have another meaning than the purely figurative one

Even the image of the Good Shepherd on the vault is explained in this light, as a hint to religious people who, although Christian, had certainly not passed the first level of initiation